Chapter 35: The Tallest One

Hyunjin had been wanted by millions of people, and he had never once believed it.

They wanted a jawline and a pair of shoulders in a white shirt.

They wanted the way he turned his head on the last beat of a chorus.

He had done the turn for nine years.

He climbed the cliff path behind the other two in the dark, with flour still caught in his hair, and he thought, they will see the page and stop.

The cabin was cold and smelled of woodsmoke.

Chan lit the stove and Felix lit the lamp, and Missy settled in the old armchair in the corner with her feet tucked under her.

Hyunjin took the pencil and the notebook from the desk, and then he put them back.

He had written the verse for a stage.

He could not read it to a room that looked at him like this.

"I'll sing it," he said.

"Anything," said Felix.

He stood in the middle of the floor in his socks, with his heart knocking in his ears.

He sang quietly, the way he did in the shower.

The verse was short and plain.

It said that he had spent years being looked at.

It said that three people had looked at him in a cabin and seen a man who forgot to put his shoes by the door.

It said he had been in love for so long he had stopped knowing how to say it.

So he had put it in a song instead.

When he finished nobody spoke.

"Which one of us is it about?" Chan said at last, his voice rough.

"Both."

"Hyunjin."

"Both of you. I love Felix, and I've wanted you for as long as I've known you, hyung, and I never said a word."

He stared at the floorboards.

"I'm sorry. I know it's too much. I know you only see the face."

Felix crossed the room in three strides and took his chin in his hand.

"Look at me."

Hyunjin looked.

"Do you know when I fell in love with you? The airport in Sydney. You were green and you threw up on my shoes, and then you apologized to the shoes."

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